April 05, 2008

There's a letter in this week's Jewish Chronicle by Deborah Fink but it's not on line. Here's what they published in the print edition:

Melanie Philips, (JC, 21st March) approves of suing those organisations which sponsor terrorism, (JC, March 21st). In that case, why not sue Israel and its financial backer, the USA, for the destruction wrought on the West Bank, Gaza and Lebanon, and the thousands of Palestinian and Lebanese lives lost?

And here's what they didn't publish:

1948 saw the dispossession of 750,000 Palestinians and destruction of 530 villages and 12 large towns. Yet, 60 years on, article 11 of UN resolution 194 has still not been implemented. This states that refugees should be allowed to return and compensation paid for the property of those who choose not to ‘and for loss of or damage to property, which should be made good by the Governments or authorities responsible’.

Since 1967, according to the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, 18,000 Palestinian homes have been demolished in the Occupied Territories, including East Jerusalem, mostly as a form of collective punishment. Israel 'has declared 73% of the West Bank "state lands," thus annulling Palestinian deeds going back generations'.

Since the start of the Second Intifada, September 2000, ‘around 50,000 people have been left homeless. Hundreds of shops, workshops, factories and public buildings, have also been destroyed or damaged. More than 3000 hectares of cultivated land have been cleared’. Wells, water storage pools, water pumps and tens of kilometres of irrigation networks have been destroyed. According to B’Tselem, over 4500 Palestinians (compared to 1000 Israelis ) have been killed by Israeli soldiers and Settlers during this period.

These law suits against the sponsors of terrorism, only highlight the irony of the perpetrators suing the victims for the result of their illegal Occupation.